Where we challenge what you won't say or you don't know…yet

Archive for January, 2015

From BNI (Business Network International) to Young Professionals and all the networking groups in between there are best practices for networking.

If you are in a professional networking organization then you will have rules, such as 1 person from each profession, each person speaks a certain amount of time, etc…

What about those networking opportunities that are not part of a professional organization?

Attending a convention

A local chamber event

A holiday party

A PTA meeting

If you are attending any of these opportunities and plan to use them as a networking event here are 4 tips to make the most of it.

1) Don’t just give everyone your card
There is nothing more annoying at an event than when you shove your card into everyone’s hand while they are engaged with someone else.

They never asked for your card.

They won’t remember why they have your card.

They will probably throw your card away, or even worse put you on their follow-up emails that you didn’t want in the first place.

2) Don’t just take everyone else’s card
The flip side of giving everyone your card is that you take everyone’s card and this is just as bad a practice.

Why did you take their card in the first place?

Do they really want the information you are about to send them or will they just click unsubscribe and hurt your online results.

Do you really want to have a business relationship with this person that you don’t know?

3) Have a plan in place in advance
When you go to a networking opportunity have a plan for who you want to meet and why you want to meet them.

Are you looking for people in a certain area of the country?

Are you looking for people with a specific skill set or experience?

Are you looking for people who fit a specific criteria that match yours?

4) Meet the people and remember the people.
This is the key to networking, are you memorable? This is what sets the best networkers apart from the others. After the event is over, even more if it is a convention over more than one day, most people will be on information overload and not remember much. When they get home and calm down, will they remember you? They will if you remember them!

Have conversation with the people you are networking with. It is better to network with fewer people and be remembered then to network with everyone in the room and be forgotten in seconds.

After your conversation with someone you should be able to make 3 notes about them on the back of their card (now you want their information) to use in future conversations and emails such as things you have in common.

Work at sharing an interesting fact about yourself that helps you stand out from the crowd of networkers.

Ask more questions and listen more than you talk. You will be remembered for being a great conversationalist.

You can network with everyone and get nothing from the experience or you can have an idea of whom you are looking for at the event, make a connection, be remembered and grow a business relationship with years of positive results.

The choice is yours.

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Chadalyst – Next networking event you are attending, don’t plan to meet everyone just plan to meet 1 person from each state, or 1 person for each letter of the alphabet (use the first letter of their last name – Good luck meeting an X)

The new year is upon us and many people make resolutions. Here’s hoping you did not as studies have shown us that most of them have sadly failed already.

Instead, during this year just make changes in your habits and your choices.

One of the choices many people make at the start of the year is to read more. Reading is a great way to learn from the masters, escape on a vacation, solve a crime, improve your skills and focus your thoughts.

Here are some suggestions on how you can read more this year…

1)Read in the car.
We know that you shouldn’t text and drive, so you probably shouldn’t read and drive. What do we mean by this then? Listen to audiobooks when you are in the car.
The average person spends 25 minutes each way commuting each day. That means at least 1 chapter a day could be listened to. That means over the course of a month you could easily listen to 1 more book.

2)Read while working out.
Again, this is a hard one to do with an actual book while you run on the treadmill, lift weights or however you choose to work out. Once again then, plug-in to an audiobook and your cardio will pass by quicker and your weights won’t seem as heavy. A 30 minute workout means another handful of books over a year.

3)Read before bed daily.
Leave a book at your nightstand and read for at least 10 minutes before you turn in for the night. If you are the person talking to this article right now and saying, “As soon as I lay down and read, I fall asleep” then don’t lay down in bed. Read in a chair, read sitting up, read in a different room.

4)Learn to speed read.

People that run fast seem to run more.

People that eat fast seem to eat more.

People that read faster seem to read more.

Sign up for a class to learn how to speed read. Even if you aren’t reading a page in 10 seconds, you will probably still read faster than you are now.

5)Leave a book in your bathroom.
We might not want to talk about this, and yet it is a room we visit in our home daily. Leave a book there, read 3 pages each time you are there. Before you know it, you will be hiding in your bathroom because you want to read more.

6)Carry a book with you.
You will end up waiting on someone daily. This might be the person making your drink at Starbucks, the appointment that is running late or on hold with the cable company. Have a book with you at all times and fill your wait, reading. Don’t want to carry a book everywhere you go? Use an app on your smart phone and carry hundreds!

7)Sign Up for Book SummariesSome people might consider this cheating, although it is a fantastic way to get more information in less time. Let someone else read the book for you and share with you the 3-5 page review. This is just like using Cliff Notes in school. Nobody will know you didn’t read the full book as you will be able to explain all of the key points.

Using this suggestions and tips will have you reading more books this year. This will lead to the next challenge, how to remember all that you read.

Get a journal and write a ONE page review of each book when you are finished. At the end of the year, you will be able to review and read all of those books again in moments.

There is only one question left…what book will you read first?

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Chadalyst – Pick one topic and read multiple books on it this year. By the end of the year you will become an expert on the topic of choice. Choose wisely!